IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 16-60805

Summary Calendar 

JERRY L. KENNEDY, 

 Plaintiff - Appellant 

v. 

JEFFERSON COUNTY HOSPITAL, 

 Defendant - Appellee 

Appeals from the United States District Court 

for the Southern District of Mississippi 

USDC No. 5:13-CV-226

Before KING, DENNIS, and COSTA, Circuit Judges. 

PER CURIAM:*

Jerry Kennedy was fired by Jefferson County Hospital. Kennedy filed 

for unemployment benefits, which were denied when an Administrative Law 

Judge from the Mississippi Department of Employment Security (MDES) 

found that Kennedy had been terminated for misconduct. His appeal of that 

 

* Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH 

CIR. R. 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fif h Circuit

FILED

May 18, 2017

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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2 

decision to the MDES Board of Review was unsuccessful. Kennedy did not 

seek judicial review of the administrative ruling. 

Instead, Kennedy started from scratch and filed a separate action in 

state court, asserting claims against a range of parties, including one for 

breach of contract against the Hospital. After the lawsuit was removed to

federal court, the district court granted the Hospital’s motion for summary 

judgment. It concluded that Kennedy was barred from bringing his contract 

claim because he had failed to appeal the MDES’s finding of misconduct in 

state court. Kennedy then filed a Rule 59(e) motion to alter the judgment, 

claiming that an intervening change in Mississippi law called for a different 

result. The district court disagreed. Kennedy now appeals. 

We review the district court’s denial of Kennedy’s Rule 59(e) motion for 

abuse of discretion. Templet v. HydroChem Inc., 367 F.3d 473, 477 (5th Cir. 

2004). Under this standard, the district court’s decision must only be 

reasonable. Ford Motor Credit Co. v. Bright, 34 F.3d 322, 324 (5th Cir. 1994). 

Amending a judgment under Rule 59(e) is only appropriate when (1) there has 

been an intervening change in the controlling law; (2) there is newly discovered 

evidence that was previously unavailable; or (3) there was a manifest error of 

law or fact. Demahy v. Schwarz Pharma, Inc., 702 F.3d 177, 182. 

The district court granted the Hospital’s motion for summary judgment, 

in part, because it held that Kennedy could not collaterally attack the MDES’s 

decision that he was fired for misconduct. In so holding, the district court 

relied on our opinion in Cox v. DeSoto Cty. Miss., 564 F.3d 745, 748 (5th Cir. 

2009). That case held that a Mississippi employee could not collaterally attack 

a decision by a state agency when she could have challenged the ruling through 

direct appeal. Id., at 748. That is the situation Kennedy is in. He does not 

dispute that he loses under Cox. 

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Instead, Kennedy argues that the Supreme Court of Mississippi’s 

opinion in Linde Health Care Staffing, Inc. v. Claiborne County Hospital

changes this rule. 198 So.3d 318 (Miss. 2016). But, as the district court 

discussed, Linde dealt with entirely separate legal issues from those addressed 

in Cox. In Linde, the Supreme Court discussed whether the Federal 

Arbitration Act or the Mississippi Rules of Civil Procedure applied to the 

timeliness of a motion for relief of judgment under Mississippi law. Id. at 322. 

It also briefly discussed whether a Mississippi court was required to recognize 

a foreign judgment that was obtained by extrinsic fraud. Id. at 323. Neither 

of these questions was at issue in Cox or here. Linde did not discuss Cox’s 

central holding—and its only relevant application to this case—about whether 

a litigant can collaterally attack a state administrative decision when there 

was no direct appeal of the ruling. Cox, 564 F.3d at 748. 

* * * 

The district court’s denial of Kennedy’s Rule 59(e) motion is AFFIRMED.

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